LP0011 - The Epitome of Theseus - The Library of Apollodorus -

Legendary Passages #0011 - The Epitome of Theseus - The Library of Apollodorus -

Last time we heard about too many statues, the Bull of Crete, as well as the time Theseus ruined Heracles' lion skin. This time we  shall hear an overview of Theseus adventures, from the Library of Apollodorus, including his journey to Athens to his slaying of the Minotaur, plus the doomed flight of Icarus and the death of Minos.

King Pandion had four sons: Lycus, Nisus, Pallas, and Aegeus, who ruled over the others. Despite two marriages he had no children, so he went to the oracle. He asked King Pittheus about the mysterious message, who then had his daughter Aethra seduce him. Aegeus left heirlooms in case she had a son.

Later, a son of Minos named Androgeus was killed, and Aegeus blamed. Minos attacked, and Aegeus' brother Nisus died. Athens under siege and famine, asked an oracle who revealed that Minos must be compensated. Minos then asked for seven boys and seven girls as tribute, to be given to the Minotaur.

The Minotaur was imprisoned in the Labyrinth, built by Daedalus. He was exiled from Athens for killing Talos, his sister's son.

When Theseus came of age and retrieved the heirlooms, he cleared the road to Athens. He killed the clubber, the pine-bender, the sow, Sciron, Cercyon, Procrustes, and arrived at Athens. Medea brews some poison, but Aegeus recognizes his old sword, and saved him, and banishes Medea.

Minos comes for tribute, and Theseus volunteers. If he returns alive he'll change the sails from black to white. Minos' daughter Ariadne helps him with a clue, but on the way home from crete, Dionysus steals her away. Theseus forgets to change the sails, and Aegeus jumps to his death. Theseus kills the fifty sons of Pallas, and becomes king.

Minos imprisons Daedalus and his son Icarus in the labyrinth, but they build wings and fly away. Icarus melted his wings by fling too high and died, but Daedalus escaped to the court of Cocalus in Sicily. His daughters killed Minos with boiling bath water.

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The Epitome of Theseus,
a Legendary Passage,
from The Library of Apollodorus,
translated by J. G. Frazer.

[3.15.5] - [E.1.15]

While Pandion was at Megara, he had sons born to him, to wit, Aegeus, Pallas, Nisus, and Lycus. But some say that Aegeus was a son of Scyrius, but was passed off by Pandion as his own.

After the death of Pandion his sons marched against Athens, expelled the Metionids, and divided the government in four; but Aegeus had the whole power.

The first wife whom he married was Meta, daughter of Hoples, and the second was Chalciope, daughter of Rhexenor. As no child was born to him, he feared his brothers, and went to Pythia and consulted the oracle concerning the begetting of children. The god answered him:

    The bulging mouth of the wineskin, O best of men, loose not until thou hast reached the height of Athens.

Not knowing what to make of the oracle, he set out on his return to Athens.

And journeying by way of Troezen, he lodged with Pittheus, son of Pelops, who, understanding the oracle, made him drunk and caused him to lie with his daughter Aethra.

But in the same night Poseidon also had connexion with her.

Now Aegeus charged Aethra that, if she gave birth to a male child, she should rear it, without telling whose it was; and he left a sword and sandals under a certain rock, saying that when the boy could roll away the rock and take them up, she was then to send him away with them.

But he himself came to Athens and celebrated the games of the Panathenian festival, in which Androgeus, son of Minos, vanquished all comers. Him Aegeus sent against the bull of Marathon, by which he was destroyed. But some say that as he journeyed to Thebes to take part in the games in honor of Laius, he was waylaid and murdered by the jealous competitors.

But when the tidings of his death were brought to Minos, as he was sacrificing to the Graces in Paros, he threw away the garland from his head and stopped the music of the flute, but nevertheless completed the sacrifice; hence down to this day they sacrifice to the Graces in Paros without flutes and garlands.

But not long afterwards, being master of the sea, he attacked Athens with a fleet and captured Megara, then ruled by king Nisus, son of Pandion, and he slew Megareus, son of Hippomenes, who had come from Onchestus to the help of Nisus.

Now Nisus perished through his daughter's treachery. For he had a purple hair on the middle of his head, and an oracle ran that when it was pulled out he should die; and his daughter Scylla fell in love with Minos and pulled out the hair. But when Minos had made himself master of Megara, he tied the damsel by the feet to the stern of the ship and drowned her.

When the war lingered on and he could not take Athens, he prayed to Zeus that he might be avenged on the Athenians. And the city being visited with a famine and a pestilence, the Athenians at first, in obedience to an ancient oracle, slaughtered the daughters of Hyacinth, to wit, Antheis, Aegleis, Lytaea, and Orthaea, on the grave of Geraestus, the Cyclops; now Hyacinth, the father of the damsels, had come from Lacedaemon and dwelt in Athens.

But when this was of no avail, they inquired of the oracle how they could be delivered; and the god answered them that they should give Minos whatever satisfaction he might choose. So they sent to Minos and left it to him to claim satisfaction. And Minos ordered them to send seven youths and the same number of damsels without weapons to be fodder for the Minotaur.

Now the Minotaur was confined in a labyrinth, in which he who entered could not find his way out; for many a winding turn shut off the secret outward way. The labyrinth was constructed by Daedalus, whose father was Eupalamus, son of Metion, and whose mother was Alcippe; for he was an excellent architect and the first inventor of images. He had fled from Athens, because he had thrown down from the acropolis Talos, the son of his sister Perdix; for Talos was his pupil, and Daedalus feared that with his talents he might surpass himself, seeing that he had sawed a thin stick with a jawbone of a snake which he had found. But the corpse was discovered; Daedalus was tried in the Areopagus, and being condemned fled to Minos. And there Pasiphae having fallen in love with the bull of Poseidon, Daedalus acted as her accomplice by contriving a wooden cow, and he constructed the labyrinth, to which the Athenians every year sent seven youths and as many damsels to be fodder for the Minotaur.

Aethra bore to Aegeus a son Theseus, and when he was grown up, he pushed away the rock and took up the sandals and the sword, and hastened on foot to Athens.

And he cleared the road, which had been beset by evildoers. For first in Epidaurus he slew Periphetes, son of Hephaestus and Anticlia, who was surnamed the Clubman from the club which he carried. For being crazy on his legs he carried an iron club, with which he despatched the passers-by. That club Theseus wrested from him and continued to carry about.

Second, he killed Sinis, son of Polypemon and Sylea, daughter of Corinthus. This Sinis was surnamed the Pine-bender; for inhabiting the Isthmus of Corinth he used to force the passersby to keep bending pine trees; but they were too weak to do so, and being tossed up by the trees they perished miserably. In that way also Theseus killed Sinis.

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Third, he slew at Crommyon the sow that was called Phaea after the old woman who bred it; that sow, some say, was the offspring of Echidna and Typhon.

Fourth, he slew Sciron, the Corinthian, son of Pelops, or, as some say, of Poseidon. He in the Megarian territory held the rocks called after him Scironian, and compelled passers-by to wash his feet, and in the act of washing he kicked them into the deep to be the prey of a huge turtle.

But Theseus seized him by the feet and threw him into the sea.

Fifth, in Eleusis he slew Cercyon, son of Branchus and a nymph Argiope. This Cercyon compelled passers-by to wrestle, and in wrestling, killed them. But Theseus lifted him up on high and dashed him to the ground.

Sixth, he slew Damastes, whom some call Polypemon. He had his dwelling beside the road, and made up two beds, one small and the other big; and offering hospitality to the passers-by, he laid the short men on the big bed and hammered them, to make them fit the bed; but the tall men he laid on the little bed and sawed off the portions of the body that projected beyond it.

So, having cleared the road, Theseus came to Athens.

But Medea, being then wedded to Aegeus, plotted against him and persuaded Aegeus to beware of him as a traitor. And Aegeus, not knowing his own son, was afraid and sent him against the Marathonian bull.

And when Theseus had killed it, Aegeus presented to him a poison which he had received the selfsame day from Medea. But just as the draught was about to be administered to him, he gave his father the sword, and on recognizing it Aegeus dashed the cup from his hands. And when Theseus was thus made known to his father and informed of the plot, he expelled Medea.

And he was numbered among those who were to be sent as the third tribute to the Minotaur; or, as some affirm, he offered himself voluntarily. And as the ship had a black sail, Aegeus charged his son, if he returned alive, to spread white sails on the ship.

And when he came to Crete, Ariadne, daughter of Minos, being amorously disposed to him, offered to help him if he would agree to carry her away to Athens and have her to wife. Theseus having agreed on oath to do so, she besought Daedalus to disclose the way out of the labyrinth.

And at his suggestion she gave Theseus a clue when he went in; Theseus fastened it to the door, and, drawing it after him, entered in. And having found the Minotaur in the last part of the labyrinth, he killed him by smiting him with his fists; and drawing the clue after him made his way out again.

And by night he arrived with Ariadne and the children at Naxos. There Dionysus fell in love with Ariadne and carried her off; and having brought her to Lemnos he enjoyed her, and begat Thoas, Staphylus, Oenopion, and Peparethus.

In his grief on account of Ariadne, Theseus forgot to spread white sails on his ship when he stood for port; and Aegeus, seeing from the acropolis the ship with a black sail, supposed that Theseus had perished; so he cast himself down and died.

But Theseus succeeded to the sovereignty of Athens, and killed the sons of Pallas, fifty in number; likewise all who would oppose him were killed by him, and he got the whole government to himself.

On being apprized of the flight of Theseus and his company, Minos shut up the guilty Daedalus in the  labyrinth, along with his son Icarus, who had been borne to Daedalus by Naucrate, a female slave of Minos. But Daedalus constructed wings for himself and his son, and enjoined his son, when he took to flight, neither to fly high, lest the glue should melt in the sun and the wings should drop off, nor to fly near the sea, lest the pinions should be detached by the damp.

But the infatuated Icarus, disregarding his father's injunctions, soared ever higher, till, the glue melting, he fell into the sea called after him Icarian, and perished. But Daedalus made his way safely to Camicus in Sicily.

And Minos pursued Daedalus, and in every country that he searched he carried a spiral shell and promised to give a great reward to him who should pass a thread through the shell, believing that by that means he should discover Daedalus. And having come to Camicus in Sicily, to the court of Cocalus, with whom Daedalus was concealed, he showed the spiral shell. Cocalus took it, and promised to thread it, and gave it to Daedalus; and Daedalus fastened a thread to an ant, and, having bored a hole in the spiral shell, allowed the ant to pass through it. But when Minos found the thread passed through the shell, he perceived that Daedalus was with Cocalus, and at once demanded his surrender.

Cocalus promised to surrender him, and made an entertainment for Minos; but after his bath Minos was undone by the daughters of Cocalus; some say, however, that he died through being drenched with boiling water.

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